Tuesday, September 24, 2013

Many elected leaders hailing from Seemandhra are under the
false impression that they can scuttle the process of formation of Telangana by
passing a negative resolution or delaying their consent when the draft bill for
State Reorganization Act is sent to the Andhra Pradesh State Assembly for their
consent. Since Seemandhras form a
majority in the State Assembly they believe they can stall the formation of
Telangana. Their belief is misguided
and not based in ground realities.

Sensing this kind of danger, wherein the majority region in
the state could thwart any attempt by the minority region from aspiring to form
a separate state, the Indian Constitution has provisioned Article 3 in the
current form, whereby the State Assembly is allowed to ‘express its views’ without any binding nature within a certain
specified period of time. The Indian Parliament
is entitled to reorganize the state with or without the consent of the State
Assembly, with or without considering the suggestions made by the State Assembly,
and also without waiting for the State Assembly to respond beyond the specified
expiration date. If for some reason, the
State Assembly is not in session or is dissolved, like in President’s Rule, the
Parliament could still go ahead and reorganize the states.

Seemandhras
have started to make Telangana people guilty, asking them to be fair, pushing
them to making concessions, forcing them to give up something if they want
separation. Their arguments can be captured as follows: “If
separatists want something, then they should give something to the
integrationists. If you are the ones who want to separate, then you can’t
have capital city - because you have to lose something to gain something.
If you want to breakup, then you need to satisfy us to get our
permission. You should make compromises if you want your dream
fulfilled.”

The
underlying assumption in all this rhetoric is that division is seen as a business
transaction or deal, a compromise between two shareholders. If the
division is to be carried out, then the Seemandhras believe it should be
‘win-win’ for all. They ask- ‘how can Telangana have all their demands
fulfilled while Seemandhra demands are not met?’

There
is something grossly wrong in looking at a geopolitical situation such as
division of a state as a business transaction.

Monday, September 23, 2013

If
one were to listen to the current arguments positioned by Seemandhras, the
central government in New Delhi, and some of our Telangana leaders, you may
actually start believing that creating a new capital city is indeed a time
consuming and complex process that could take many years. There is a
general consensus amongst many stakeholders that it may take as much as ten
years for Seemandhras to create a new capital city. While
Seemandhras believe that they may need many decades because they hope to create
an exact replica of Hyderabad before they let go Hyderabad, many naïve
Telangana concede that it is only ‘fair’ to allow Seemandhras to continue using
Hyderabad as temporary capital for a period of ten years.

Does
it really take so many years to create a new capital city as we are being led
to believe?

Let’s
look at some real examples from geopolitical history and see if there is any
merit in this common belief shared by most Seemandhras and some
Telanganas.

When
the Labor Party came to power in England in 1945 following the World War II,
they had an explicit agenda – to grand independence to its biggest colony, the
Indian subcontinent. Lord Mountbatten was chosen as the last Viceroy to
oversee the transition of power from the King of England to the people of the
subcontinent.

Saturday, September 21, 2013

Investors
tend to invest in those places which give rich dividends. In India, some
of the most favored destinations are the large metropolitan cities. By
1956, Hyderabad was already the 5th largest city in India, was
covered by TIME Magazine, and it boasted world class infrastructure with major
universities, industries, water bodies and institutions – all this was already
in place before formation of Andhra Pradesh – so it had nothing to do with
contribution of Seemandhras.

Not all
states are blessed with cosmopolitan and metropolitan cities - there are very
few cities in India while there are many states. Therefore, the
businessmen and entrepreneurs hailing from states like Orissa, Chhattisgarh,
Madhya Pradesh, Kerala, tend to invest in the major cities outside their
states, like in New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Hyderabad.

What helped
Hyderabad to become a favored destination for investment in the last six
decades consists of two essential reasons. One, after Independence,
Indian government looked for safe destinations that were away from the border
and away from the coast to develop its major establishments. Hyderabad is
one of those choices along with Bangalore, lying in the South and away from the
coast. Unlike in British ruled cities, where the city lands were owned by
private individuals, most of the land in Hyderabad city was owned by Nizam,
which later became property of the Government. Therefore, Hyderabad presented
a much better case with easily available lands for expansion and installation
of major institutions. The Indian Government installed many premier
industries in Hyderabad, like ECIL, BHEL, HAL, DRDO, DRDL, etc. – and this has
nothing to do with contribution from Seemandhras or Telanganas.

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

Telangana
has an aspiration – it dreams of a day when it will attain freedom from its
current colonial masters, the Andhras. When I call Andhras as colonial
masters, I am not referring to just their political leaders or the rich
industrialists – I am talking about entire Seemandhra people who are now
engaged in Samaikyandhra agitations to scuttle the formation of
Telangana. I am talking about the common men and women of Andhra, the
very same people who came on an invasion campaign into the heart of Telangana
to hold their ‘anti-Telangana’ Sabha, right in the middle of our cities, and in
the process assaulted our people while we stood helpless.

The last
forty five days of their agitations has only confirmed it for all Telangana
people that it is not just Seemandhra leaders who are keen on holding onto
Telangana. We understand quite clearly and emphatically without an iota
of doubt that the entire population of Seemandhra wants to perpetuate their
hegemony and colonial rule over Telangana.

Wednesday, September 04, 2013

These
are the ‘genuine’ fears expressed by Seemandhra people and their leaders in
Samaikyandhra agitations.

All
Seemandhras would lose their jobs instantly

All
Seemandhras whether they are living in Telangana or in Seemandhra will
instantly lose their jobs with creation of Telangana. One needs to
understand why. Most Seemandhras are currently employed only in Telangana
and that too only in government sector, taking up jobs meant for
Telanganas. They will lose these jobs immediately. In
addition, Seemandhras will lose their jobs within Seemandhra for unknown
reasons, but known explicably to Samaikyandhra activists. Seemandhra teachers
will lose their jobs, because all Seemandhra students will stop going to school
due to the heart-break caused by the murder of their beloved Telugu Talli.
Bankers in Seemandhra will lose their jobs because banks would become empty
after spending the money on Samaikyandhra agitations. All lawyers in
Seemandhra will have no cases to fight because currently most of them are
engaged in fighting against Telangana activists.